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Lithosphere
cutaway from core to exosphere.]] The lithosphere (IPA: , from the Greek λίθος [lithos] for "rocky" + σφαῖρα [sphaira] for "sphere") is the rigidSkinner, B.J. & Porter, S.C.: Physical Geology, page 17, chapt. The Earth: Inside and Out, 1987, John Wiley & Sons, ISBN 0-471-05668-5 outermost shell of a rocky planet. Earth's lithosphere In the Earth, the lithosphere includes the crust and the uppermost mantle, which constitute the hard and rigid outer layer of the Earth. The lithosphere is underlain by the asthenosphere, the weaker, hotter, and deeper part of the upper mantle. The boundary between the lithosphere and the underlying asthenosphere is defined by a difference in response to stress: the lithosphere remains rigid for very long periods of geologic time in which it deforms elastically and through brittle failure, while the asthenosphere deforms viscously and accommodates strain through plastic deformation. The lithosphere is broken into tectonic plates. The concept of the lithosphere as Earth’s strong outer layer was developed by Barrell, who wrote a series of papers introducing the concept.Barrell, J. 1914 The strength of the Earth's crust. Journal of Geology.22, 425-433.Barrell, J. 1914 The strength of the Earth's crust. Journal of Geology 22, 441-468.Barrell, J. 1914 The strength of the Earth's crust. Journal of Geology 22, 655-683. The concept was based on the presence of significant gravity anomalies over continental crust, from which he inferred that there must exist a strong upper layer (which he called the lithosphere) above a weaker layer which could flow (which he called the asthenosphere). These ideas were expanded by Daly (1940)Daly, R. 1940 Strength and structure of the Earth. New York: Prentice-Hall., and have been broadly accepted by geologists and geophysicists. Although these ideas about lithosphere and asthenosphere were developed long before plate tectonic theory was articulated in the 1960s, the concepts that strong lithosphere exists and that this rests on weak asthenosphere are essential to that theory. The lithosphere provides a conductive lid atop the convecting mantle; as such, it affects heat transport through the Earth. There are two types of lithosphere: * Oceanic lithosphere, which is associated with Oceanic crust and exists in the ocean basins * Continental lithosphere, which is associated with Continental crust Oceanic lithosphere is typically about 50-100 km thick (but beneath the mid-ocean ridges is no thicker than the crust), while continental lithosphere has a range in thickness from about 40 km to perhaps 200 km; the upper ~30 to ~50 km of typical continental lithosphere is crust. The mantle part of the lithosphere consists largely of peridotite. The crust is distinguished from the upper mantle by the change in chemical composition that takes place at the Moho discontinuity. Oceanic lithosphere Oceanic lithosphere consists mainly of mafic crust and ultramafic mantle (peridotite) and is denser than continental lithosphere, for which the mantle is associated with crust made of felsic rocks. Oceanic lithosphere thickens as it ages and moves away from the mid-ocean ridge. This thickening occurs by conductive cooling, which converts hot asthenosphere into lithospheric mantle, and causes the oceanic lithosphere to become increasingly thick and dense with age. The thickness of the mantle part of the oceanic lithosphere can be approximated as a thermal boundary layer that thickens as the square root of time. :: \, h \, \sim \, 2\, \sqrt{ \kappa t } \, Here, h is the thickness of the oceanic mantle lithosphere, \kappa is the thermal conductivity (approximately 10-6 m2/s), and t is time. Oceanic lithosphere is less dense than asthenosphere for a few tens of millions of years, but after this becomes increasingly denser than asthenosphere. This is because the chemically-differentiated oceanic crust is ligher than asthenosphere, but due to thermal contraction, the mantle lithosphere is more dense than the asthenosphere. The gravitational instability of mature oceanic lithosphere has the effect that at subduction zones, oceanic lithosphere invariably sinks underneath the overriding lithosphere, which can be oceanic or continental. New oceanic lithosphere is constantly being produced at mid-ocean ridges and is recycled back to the mantle at subduction zones. As a result, oceanic lithosphere is much younger than continental lithosphere: the oldest oceanic lithosphere is about 170 million years old, while parts of the continental lithosphere are billions of years old. The oldest parts of continental lithosphere underlie cratons, and the mantle lithosphere there is thicker and less dense than typical; the relatively low density of such mantle "roots of cratons" helps to stabilize these regions.Jordan, T. H. 1978 Composition and development of the continental tectosphere. Nature 274, 544-548.O’Reilly, Suzanne Y. et al. (2009) "Ultradeep continental roots and their oceanic remnants: A solution to the geochemical “mantle reservoir” problem?" LITHOS doi: 10.1016/j.lithos.2009.04.028 Lithosphere in the mantle Geophysical studies in the early 21st Century posit that large pieces of the lithosphere have been subducted into the mantle as deep as 2900 km to near the core-mantle boundaryBurke, K. and Torsvik, T. H. (2004) "Derivation of Large Igneous Provinces of the past 200 million years from long-term heterogeneities in the deep mantle'' Earth and Planetary Science Letters 227: pp. 531-538, while others "float" in the upper mantle,Replumaz, A. et al. (2004) "4-D evolution of SE Asia's mantle from geological reconstructions and seismic tomography" Earth and Planetary Science Letters 221: pp. 103-115, doi:10.1016/S0012-821X(04)00070-6Li, Chang et al. (2008) "A new global model for P wave speed variations in Earth's mantle" Geochemistry Geophysics Geosystems 9(5): Q05018, doi: 10.1029/2007GC001806 while some stick down into the mantle as far as 400 km but remain "attached" to the continental plate above,O’Reilly, Suzanne Y. et al. (2009) "Ultradeep continental roots and their oceanic remnants: A solution to the geochemical “mantle reservoir” problem" Lithos doi:10.1016/j.lithos.2009.04.028 similar to the extent of the "tectosphere" proposed by Jordan in 1988.Jordan, T.H. (1988) "Structure and formation of the continental tectosphere" Journal of Petrology 29(Special Lithosphere Issue): pp. 11-38 Mantle Xenoliths Geoscientists can directly study the nature of the subcontinental mantle by examining mantle xenoliths brought up in kimberlite and other volcanic pipes. The histories of these xenoliths have been investigated by many methods, including analyses of abundances of isotopes of osmium and rhenium. Such studies have confirmed that mantle lithospheres below some cratons have persisted for periods in excess of 3 billion years, despite the mantle flow that accompanies plate tectonics.Carlson, R. W., Pearson, D. G., and James, D. E., 2004, Physical, chemical, and chronological characteristics of continental mantle. Reviews of Geophysics 43, 8755-1209/05/2004RG000156. References * Stanley Chernicoff and Donna Whitney. Geology. An Introduction to Physical Geology, 4th ed., Pearson 1990 External links * Earth's Crust, Lithosphere and Asthenosphere * Crust and Lithosphere See also *Biosphere *Cryosphere *Earth's atmosphere *Hydrosphere *Kola Superdeep Borehole *Pedosphere *Plate tectonics *Table of Global Climate System Components Category:Plate tectonics Category:Physical geography Category:Structure of the Earth Category:Systems ecology ar:متكور يابس be-x-old:Літасфэра bs:Litosfera bg:Литосфера cs:Litosféra cy:Lithosffer da:Lithosfære de:Lithosphäre et:Litosfäär es:Litosfera eo:Litosfero eu:Litosfera fr:Lithosphère gl:Litosfera ko:암권 hr:Litosfera id:Litosfer it:Litosfera he:ליתוספירה kk:Литосфера lv:Litosfēra lt:Litosfera hu:Litoszféra mk:Литосфера nl:Lithosfeer ja:リソスフェア no:Litosfære pl:Litosfera pt:Litosfera ro:Litosferă ru:Литосфера sq:Litosfera simple:Lithosphere sk:Litosféra sl:Litosfera sr:Литосфера fi:Litosfääri sv:Litosfär uk:Літосфера vi:Thạch quyển vls:Lithosfeer zh:岩石圈